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Some notes

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I made a slight addition to clarify that the Laplcae equation is still used in science. It is perhaps not phrased in the most artful manner but I thought it important to dispel any impression that advances in physics has made the Laplace equation obsolete., an impression that you might get from reading the first paragraph.

I have suggested a merger with [harmonic function] in that discussion page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.229.231.115 (talk) 19:38, 26 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

WikiProject class rating

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This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 10:01, 10 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Probabilistic potential theory

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Can someone add information about probabilistic potential theory to this article? Kaldari (talk) 03:22, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Hello, I was passing through and added a short paragraph to the introduction, and a reference (Snell) to the bibliography. This is quite terrible, and I'm not a regular wikipedian, but maybe it is a starting point. Unfortunately, I am not at all knowledgeable about potential theory outside of the discrete case. Would it be worthwhile to add some discussion of the state-of-the-art as of about 10 years ago? Also, as a probabilist, it seems like there should be some discussion of Green's functions - does this seem reasonable? Do analysts on this page know if they are as important there as they seem from the probability side? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.48.237.250 (talk) 04:03, 30 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Completely useless article

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I have great hopes for this article. But at present it is 100% useless, in that anyone who doesn't know what potential theory is and who tries to learn what it is by reading the article will come away knowing even less than when they began.

How about one example of a concrete theorem in potential theory? One example of a concrete calculation? One example of a concrete question that potential theory seeks to answer? And yes, the word "concrete" is essential.2600:1700:E1C0:F340:BC15:5C36:8F31:B21E (talk) 00:48, 19 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@2600:1700:E1C0:F340:BC15:5C36:8F31:B21E: We have articles that are inaccurate, biased, poorly written, or just plain rubbish. That comes with our ambitious goals, and the way we work. And on many of these articles, we do actually have cleanup signs! Editors work to gradually improve articles that are incomplete or need editing, and at the end of the day, Wikipedia will be of a higher quality than the day before, though we will likely never have a perfect encyclopedia. You are, of course, free to be bold and contribute to alleviate your concerns on this article instead of simply rejecting its value. Wikipedia is, after all, a collaboration! Cheers, Rosalina2427 (talk to me) 01:07, 19 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
By the way, the cited EoM article contains more concrete content. Boris Tsirelson (talk) 04:43, 19 August 2018 (UTC)[reply]
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The attribution to planetmath is broken. The correct link should be https://planetmath.org/potentialtheory but I don't know how to edit this link that seems to be automatically generated. --Das O2 (talk) 13:20, 12 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Completely useless article

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I could have just replied to a section above.

But I am starting a new section because it is still true that this article contains zero useful information.

I still hope someone knowledgeable about potential theory can improve this article at least to the point that it is passable. 2601:200:C000:1A0:8CCD:BE6:81B5:7F9 (talk) 03:15, 29 August 2022 (UTC)[reply]

This section could be a million times more useful

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One passage reads as follows:

"Although it is not a symmetry in the usual sense of the term, we can start with the observation that the Laplace equation is linear. This means that the fundamental object of study in potential theory is a linear space of functions."

There is no point in speaking in generalities if no specifics are offered, like here.

What is the "linear space of functions" referred to here? Don't keep us guessing.

Plus there is no benefit to using language in a nonstandard way, especially in an encyclopedia article on an abstruse topic.

If linearity is not a symmetry, then don't call it one. That only confuses people further who have learned nothing about the subject from the rest of the article.

2601:204:F181:9410:D57B:F294:6FBE:BDE9 (talk) 02:14, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]